The Restoration Team was able to match the panels to their exact Madison-era locations by looking at the nail holes found on both the paneling and the ca. 1764 framing and nailers. If the team could find a series of nail holes in both elements that aligned, then they could be certain that the panel had once been installed in that location. However, even after the nails were matched, one obstacle remained. Since the panels were installed in two different locations during the Madison ownership of Montpelier, how could the Restoration Team tell the ca. 1764 nail holes from the ca. 1812 nail holes? Fortunately, because nail making technology changed dramatically between ca. 1764 and ca. 1809 when nails changed from being hand wrought to being made by a machine, it was possible to identify which nails in the paneling dated to which of the two different Madison-eras.